By Greg Fry

Kamloops welcomes 1.8 million visitors in 2017

Jan 4, 2018 | 10:43 AM

KAMLOOPS — Visits to Kamloops were up year over year in 2017.

Tourism Kamloops CEO Beverley DeSantis says approximately 1.8 million visitors passed through town.

“Which was up from the previous year by seven or eight per cent. It’s $58 million in projected hotel revenues which is quite substantial.”

She attributes the increase to a number of things.

“We were very aggressive on social media. We changed our brand. We really got out there with our social and digital. Our conversations with Travel Trade. We hosted over 550 Travel Trade folks from around the globe here,” DeSantis says. “And we invited the media here to tell our great story. We had over 27 stories published globally year to date in multiple publications.”

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She says the wildfires didn’t affect the numbers either.

“I think it’s a wash as far as revenues go for our accommodators because we normally have quite high vacancy in July and August anyway. So, the visitors didn’t come but the evacuees were able to secure places to stay during this time for them.”

DeSantis says the majority of visitors came from Britsh Columbia, followed by Alberta, Ontario, Washington State and California. She says there were also quite a few overnight stops by visitors from Asia, not to mention a lot of “stay and play visitors” from the United Kingdom and Germany.

And with the BC Winter Games coming to Kamloops next month, Hometown Hockey arriving next week, and a new direct flight from Toronto set to start this spring, DeSantis is looking forward to a strong 2018.

“We’re also going to continue on with promoting our new brand, really enhancing our community and industry collaboration and concentrating on building the desirability of Kamloops to inspire people to visit.”